Leather punch



June 10, 1952 SWEET 2,599,877

LEATHER PUNCH Filed June 13, 194'? {Q I m'entar R nland EI 5 weal".

Attorneys Patented June 10, 1952 UNITED- TATES PATENT OF'FI'QE" LEATHER P CH H g r r Roland G. Sweet, Pleasantn, Calif., assignor to Alfred Roberts, Concord, Calif. 7

Application June 13, 1947, Serial No. 754,502

1 a This invention relates toan improved punch for forming a row of holes in leather to be hand laced and more particularly to a punch which is so constructed that the holes formed thereby will have their longitudinal axes disposed at an oblique angle to the axis of the row of the openings to accurately conform to the natural angle at which leather should be laced, thereby improving the appearance of the work after the lacing has been accomplished and producing a stronger construction by eliminating the gap ordinarily left, by conventional punches in the lace holes after lacing.

Still another object of the invention is to provide a punch the use of which will effect a substantial saving in the length of the lace required for a particular job and which will enable more rapid and better hand lacing, thus effecting economy in labor and material.

Still a further object of the invention is to provide a punch capable of use on thicker pieces of leather, such as cowhide and heavy tooling steer, usually employed in the making of ladies handbags and purses, and which punch can be more readily withdrawn from the leather after the punching operation has been accomplished.

Still a further object of the invention is to provide a punch which will accomplish a finer and neater slit when used on thin leather.

Various other objects and advantages of the invention will hereinafter become more fully apparent from the following description of the drawing, illustrating a preferred embodiment thereof, and wherein:

Figure 1 is a perspective view of a punch constructed in accordance with the invention;

Figure 2 is an end view in elevation thereof looking toward the pronged or cutting end of the punch;

Figure 3 is an enlarged fragmentary plan view of a portion of the punch including one of the punching prongs;

Figure 4 is a cross sectional view through a prong taken substantially along a plane as indicated by the line 44 of Figure 3;

Figure 5 is an edge view in elevation showing the punch in operation, and

Figure 6 is a plan view of a partially laced piece of leather and showing the arrangement of the openings formed by the punch.

Referring more specifically to the drawing, the improved punch in its entirety is designated generally l and includes an elongated, relatively wide bar 8 which may be formed of any suitable material such as tool steel and which is notched and 2 Claims. (Cl. 164 1 19) f beveled atone end thereof to form a series of transversely spaced, corresponding prongs or punching blades 9, each of which is provided with outwardly converging sides In which merge at their outer ends to form a cutting edge II and sides or faces I2 which are beveled slightly to converge toward the cutting edge H, as best seen in Figure 5. The sides III of each of the prongs 9 are each disposed at an oblique angle to the plane of the bar 8 and to the planes of the faces I2, as best seen in Figure 2.

The remainder of the bar 8 constitutes the handle or shank portion of the punch I and said punch. when in an operative position, is adapted to be disposed substantially upright or perpendicular to a work piece to be engaged thereby, as seen in Figure 5, said work piece [3 constituting a piece of leather, as seen in Figure 6, in which a row of lace openings is to be formed. To form the lace openings, the plane of the punch II is disposed parallel to and adjacent an edge of the piece of leather to be laced and the punch is driven downwardly by any suitable impact means for forming a row of openings [4 disposed parallel to said edge to be laced at any desired distance therefrom, and with the openings 14 spaced at intervals equal to the intervals between the prongs 9, by means of which said openings M are formed, by portions of the prongs 9 passing therethrough. This operation is repeated as many times as required to provide any desired number of openings I.

As clearly illustrated in Figure 6, the openings l4 are individually disposed with their longitudinal axes oblique to the partially laced edge of the leather piece l3, so that when said edge is laced, as partially indicated at IS, the individual lacings extending along the sides of the leather piece l3 will be disposed approximately at right angles to the longitudinal axes of the openings [4 so that the portions of the lacings passing therethrough will substantially fill said openings M to provide a stronger and neater construction and to accomplish a saving in the length of lacing required for a given job due to the fact that there is no twisting of the lacing adjacent the openings l4.

Obviously, the punch 1 may .be made of any desired width and to include any number of prongs 9, and various other modifications and changes are likewise contemplated and may obviously be resorted to, without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention as hereinafter defined by the appended claims.

I claim as my invention: 7

1. A leather punch of the character described consisting of an elongated flat bar provided with a series of transversely spaced notches in one end thereof forming a plurality of punching prongs at said bar end, said prongs being disposed in transversely spaced relationship relatively to said end of thebar and in transverse alignment, each of said prongs :having outwardly converging sides forming a cutting edge at the outer end of the bar, each of said sides being disposed at an oblique angle relatively to the plane of the bar, the planes of said prongs and the planes of the cutting edges thereof all being disposed parallel to one another and at oblique angles to the plane oflthebar; "each of the prong having two faces forming'extensions of opposite sides of theibar.

2. A leather punch as in claim 1, and wherein the two faces of eachpeprong are tapered toward the outer end of said prong and beveled slightly from the inner end' to the outer 'end of theprong.

' ROLIAND GiSWEET.

REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record in the file of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name 7 Date 113,008 Bigelow Mar. 28, 1871 339,798 Mayerhoif Apr. 13, 1886 {370,985 stimpson Get. 4, 1887 10 541,306 Arnold June 18, 1895 771,419 Conover Oct. 4, 1904 945,445 Carr Jan. 4, 1910 1,477,967 Lindstrom Dec. 18, 1923 1,948,081 Silver Feb. 20, 1934 15 2,011 );009 Brightwerr Aug. 6, 1935 2,142,728 Kienzle Jan. 3, 1937 2,403,035 -Wh itson July 2, 1946 FOREIGN PATENTS 20 Number Country v Date 24,498 Australia Deon-24, 1930 856384 I'France Mar.-4, 1940 

